This chapter proposes that one of the ways in which Caribbean Classics has been liberated from the colonial curriculum is through the rejection of the idea of a continuous transmission of empire from ...
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This chapter proposes that one of the ways in which Caribbean Classics has been liberated from the colonial curriculum is through the rejection of the idea of a continuous transmission of empire from Rome's empire to the British Empire. Starting with Austin Clarke's The Polished Hoe (2002), the chapter traces variations on this theme in V. S. Naipaul (The Mimic Men (1967), and A Bend in the River (1979) ), and the poetry of Derek Walcott. These writers each play with the misquotation and mistranslation of Latin in modern Caribbean literature in order to expose gaps and elisions in British colonial appropriations of Classics. It transpires that the misquotation of Latin in these texts is not a simple matter. Particularly in Clarke and Naipaul, misquotation shows up a miscarriage in the process of translation and, correspondingly, a miscarriage in the succession of empire. If the classical texts quoted in colonial contexts mean something else, or are misquoted, then the narrative of imperial continuity (the translatio studii et imperii) loses cogency.Less

Translatio studii et imperii : The Manipulation of Latin in Modern Caribbean Literature

Emily Greenwood

Published in print: 2010-01-28

This chapter proposes that one of the ways in which Caribbean Classics has been liberated from the colonial curriculum is through the rejection of the idea of a continuous transmission of empire from Rome's empire to the British Empire. Starting with Austin Clarke's The Polished Hoe (2002), the chapter traces variations on this theme in V. S. Naipaul (The Mimic Men (1967), and A Bend in the River (1979) ), and the poetry of Derek Walcott. These writers each play with the misquotation and mistranslation of Latin in modern Caribbean literature in order to expose gaps and elisions in British colonial appropriations of Classics. It transpires that the misquotation of Latin in these texts is not a simple matter. Particularly in Clarke and Naipaul, misquotation shows up a miscarriage in the process of translation and, correspondingly, a miscarriage in the succession of empire. If the classical texts quoted in colonial contexts mean something else, or are misquoted, then the narrative of imperial continuity (the translatio studii et imperii) loses cogency.

This chapter explores the transition between migrant and British-born/raised positioning through the figures of V. S. Naipaul and Salman Rushdie, arguing that the common reading of their liminal ...
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This chapter explores the transition between migrant and British-born/raised positioning through the figures of V. S. Naipaul and Salman Rushdie, arguing that the common reading of their liminal positioning can be reconsidered to emphasise the transition from migrant to British Asian consciousness. Are Naipul and Rushdie British authors, needing to be read within the context of an increasingly multicultural British literature? They are not alone in being based for the majority of their lives in Britain but being born elsewhere, and both reflect their status as postcolonial, rather than British Asian, authors, in their principal concern for the trauma of migration. While each authors' characters straddle alienation and confident belonging, the authorial voice in both cases is testament to the latter. In this respect, marginality is only employed strategically: what Graham Huggan refers to as both authors' ‘staged marginality’. Both Rushdie and Naipaul capture a Britishness being changed to accommodate its ethnic citizens.Less

Salman Rushdie and V. S. Naipaul

Sara Upstone

Published in print: 2010-09-01

This chapter explores the transition between migrant and British-born/raised positioning through the figures of V. S. Naipaul and Salman Rushdie, arguing that the common reading of their liminal positioning can be reconsidered to emphasise the transition from migrant to British Asian consciousness. Are Naipul and Rushdie British authors, needing to be read within the context of an increasingly multicultural British literature? They are not alone in being based for the majority of their lives in Britain but being born elsewhere, and both reflect their status as postcolonial, rather than British Asian, authors, in their principal concern for the trauma of migration. While each authors' characters straddle alienation and confident belonging, the authorial voice in both cases is testament to the latter. In this respect, marginality is only employed strategically: what Graham Huggan refers to as both authors' ‘staged marginality’. Both Rushdie and Naipaul capture a Britishness being changed to accommodate its ethnic citizens.

This chapter considers V. S. Naipaul as a belated modernist who exhibits what Harold Bloom terms an acute anxiety of influence. Naipaul denies any debt to Anglophone modernism and is widely ...
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This chapter considers V. S. Naipaul as a belated modernist who exhibits what Harold Bloom terms an acute anxiety of influence. Naipaul denies any debt to Anglophone modernism and is widely considered a Dickensian realist. Focusing on The Enigma of Arrival (1987) and A Way in the World (1994), the chapter examines Naipaul’s postcolonial redeployment of Conrad’s delayed decoding, Joyce and Woolf’s hypersubjectivized first-person narration, Kafka’s expressionistic and de Chirico’s surrealistic antirealism, and Proust’s manipulation of narrative chronology. Naipaul’s lack of interest in modernism is a feint, a mark of his sense of belatedness in relation to modern European culture and of an artistic ressentiment both crippling and empowering. The chapter contends that Naipaul’s sly use of modernism embraces inauthenticity as the basis for redefining modernity itself. Naipaul casts himself as the New World subject: a modern, self-made individual constantly reinventing himself and his world with only the found artifacts of an “alien” cultural legacy at his disposal.Less

Worlds Lost and Founded : S. Naipaul as Belated Modernist

Michael Valdez Moses

Published in print: 2018-12-27

This chapter considers V. S. Naipaul as a belated modernist who exhibits what Harold Bloom terms an acute anxiety of influence. Naipaul denies any debt to Anglophone modernism and is widely considered a Dickensian realist. Focusing on The Enigma of Arrival (1987) and A Way in the World (1994), the chapter examines Naipaul’s postcolonial redeployment of Conrad’s delayed decoding, Joyce and Woolf’s hypersubjectivized first-person narration, Kafka’s expressionistic and de Chirico’s surrealistic antirealism, and Proust’s manipulation of narrative chronology. Naipaul’s lack of interest in modernism is a feint, a mark of his sense of belatedness in relation to modern European culture and of an artistic ressentiment both crippling and empowering. The chapter contends that Naipaul’s sly use of modernism embraces inauthenticity as the basis for redefining modernity itself. Naipaul casts himself as the New World subject: a modern, self-made individual constantly reinventing himself and his world with only the found artifacts of an “alien” cultural legacy at his disposal.

Afro‐Greeks explores dialogues between anglophone Caribbean literature and the complex legacies of ancient Greece and Rome, from the 1920s to the beginning of the twenty‐first century. ...
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Afro‐Greeks explores dialogues between anglophone Caribbean literature and the complex legacies of ancient Greece and Rome, from the 1920s to the beginning of the twenty‐first century. Classics still bears the negative associations of the colonial educational curriculum that was thrust upon the British West Indies with the Victorian triad of the three Cs (Cricket, Classics, and Christianity). In a study that embraces Kamau Brathwaite, Austin Clarke, John Figueroa, C. L. R. James, V. S. Naipaul, Derek Walcott, and Eric Williams, the author traces a distinctive regional tradition of engaging with Classics in the English‐speaking Caribbean. She argues that, following on from C. L. R. James's revisionist approach to the history of ancient Greece, there has been a practice of reading the Classics for oneself in anglophone Caribbean literature, a practice that has contributed to the larger project of the articulation of the Caribbean self. The writers examined offered a strenuous critique of an exclusive, Western conception of Graeco‐Roman antiquity, often conducting this critique through literary subterfuge, playing on the colonial prejudice that Classics did not belong to them. Afro‐Greeks examines both the terms of this critique, and the way in which these writers have made Classics theirs.Less

Afro-Greeks : Dialogues between Anglophone Caribbean Literature and Classics in the Twentieth Century

Emily Greenwood

Published in print: 2010-01-28

Afro‐Greeks explores dialogues between anglophone Caribbean literature and the complex legacies of ancient Greece and Rome, from the 1920s to the beginning of the twenty‐first century. Classics still bears the negative associations of the colonial educational curriculum that was thrust upon the British West Indies with the Victorian triad of the three Cs (Cricket, Classics, and Christianity). In a study that embraces Kamau Brathwaite, Austin Clarke, John Figueroa, C. L. R. James, V. S. Naipaul, Derek Walcott, and Eric Williams, the author traces a distinctive regional tradition of engaging with Classics in the English‐speaking Caribbean. She argues that, following on from C. L. R. James's revisionist approach to the history of ancient Greece, there has been a practice of reading the Classics for oneself in anglophone Caribbean literature, a practice that has contributed to the larger project of the articulation of the Caribbean self. The writers examined offered a strenuous critique of an exclusive, Western conception of Graeco‐Roman antiquity, often conducting this critique through literary subterfuge, playing on the colonial prejudice that Classics did not belong to them. Afro‐Greeks examines both the terms of this critique, and the way in which these writers have made Classics theirs.

This chapter examines V. S. Naipaul's attitude towards Joseph Conrad by focusing on the complex manner in which colonial societies and colonial identity are revisioned in the novel The Enigma of ...
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This chapter examines V. S. Naipaul's attitude towards Joseph Conrad by focusing on the complex manner in which colonial societies and colonial identity are revisioned in the novel The Enigma of Arrival. It considers how Naipaul destroys the colonial fantasy of ‘security’ in the novel — that is, the notion of ‘a fixed world’ where England is of timeless perfection and the disorder of ‘half-made societies that seemed doomed to remain half-made’. It demonstrates how the dynamics of The Enigma of Arrival are sustained upon a series of translations and self-translations whereby Naipaul constructs himself as colonised subject, migrant, and postcolonial writer. Drawing on examples from the late essay ‘Geography and Some Explorers’, the chapter shows how Conrad ‘meditated’ on his world and draws geographical discovery into the province of romance. It also analyses Conrad's progressivist reading of geography, his place in the history of exploration, and his fanciful mapmaking in relation to the deeds of adventurous explorers.Less

(Post)colonial Translations in V. S. Naipaul's The Enigma of Arrival

Shirley Chew

Published in print: 1999-05-01

This chapter examines V. S. Naipaul's attitude towards Joseph Conrad by focusing on the complex manner in which colonial societies and colonial identity are revisioned in the novel The Enigma of Arrival. It considers how Naipaul destroys the colonial fantasy of ‘security’ in the novel — that is, the notion of ‘a fixed world’ where England is of timeless perfection and the disorder of ‘half-made societies that seemed doomed to remain half-made’. It demonstrates how the dynamics of The Enigma of Arrival are sustained upon a series of translations and self-translations whereby Naipaul constructs himself as colonised subject, migrant, and postcolonial writer. Drawing on examples from the late essay ‘Geography and Some Explorers’, the chapter shows how Conrad ‘meditated’ on his world and draws geographical discovery into the province of romance. It also analyses Conrad's progressivist reading of geography, his place in the history of exploration, and his fanciful mapmaking in relation to the deeds of adventurous explorers.

This book provides an historical account of the publication and reception of South Asian Anglophone writing from the 1930s to the present, based on original archival research drawn from a range of ...
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This book provides an historical account of the publication and reception of South Asian Anglophone writing from the 1930s to the present, based on original archival research drawn from a range of publishing houses. This comparison of succeeding generations of writers who emigrated to, or were born in, Britain examines how the experience of migrancy, the attitudes towards migrant writers in the literary marketplace, and the critical reception of them, changed significantly throughout the 20th century. The book shows how the aesthetic, cultural, and political context changed significantly for each generation, producing radically different kinds of writing and transforming the role of the post-colonial writer of South Asian origin. The extensive use of original materials from publishers' archives shows how shifting political, academic, and commercial agendas in Britain and North America influenced the selection, content, presentation, and consumption of many of these texts. The differences between writers of different generations can thus in part be understood in terms of the different demands of their publishers and expectations of readers in each decade. Writers from different generations are paired accordingly in each chapter: Nirad Chaudhuri (1897–1999) with Tambimuttu (1915–83); Ambalavener Sivanandan (born 1923) with Kamala Markandaya (born 1924); Salman Rushdie (born 1947) with Farrukh Dhondy (born 1944); and Hanif Kureishi (born 1954) with Meera Syal (born 1963). Raja Rao, Mulk Raj Anand, Attia Hosain, V. S. Naipaul, and Aubrey Menen are also discussed.Less

South Asian Writers in Twentieth-Century Britain : Culture in Translation

Ruvani Ranasinha

Published in print: 2007-02-22

This book provides an historical account of the publication and reception of South Asian Anglophone writing from the 1930s to the present, based on original archival research drawn from a range of publishing houses. This comparison of succeeding generations of writers who emigrated to, or were born in, Britain examines how the experience of migrancy, the attitudes towards migrant writers in the literary marketplace, and the critical reception of them, changed significantly throughout the 20th century. The book shows how the aesthetic, cultural, and political context changed significantly for each generation, producing radically different kinds of writing and transforming the role of the post-colonial writer of South Asian origin. The extensive use of original materials from publishers' archives shows how shifting political, academic, and commercial agendas in Britain and North America influenced the selection, content, presentation, and consumption of many of these texts. The differences between writers of different generations can thus in part be understood in terms of the different demands of their publishers and expectations of readers in each decade. Writers from different generations are paired accordingly in each chapter: Nirad Chaudhuri (1897–1999) with Tambimuttu (1915–83); Ambalavener Sivanandan (born 1923) with Kamala Markandaya (born 1924); Salman Rushdie (born 1947) with Farrukh Dhondy (born 1944); and Hanif Kureishi (born 1954) with Meera Syal (born 1963). Raja Rao, Mulk Raj Anand, Attia Hosain, V. S. Naipaul, and Aubrey Menen are also discussed.

This chapter offers a reading of V. S. Naipaul's novel A Bend in the River, which chronicles the rapid changes in the Democratic Republic of the Congo after independence. It first provides a ...
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This chapter offers a reading of V. S. Naipaul's novel A Bend in the River, which chronicles the rapid changes in the Democratic Republic of the Congo after independence. It first provides a historical background on the arbitrary drawing or redrawing of national boundaries in Africa before discussing its implications for nationalism or internationalism in the region.Less

V. S. Naipaul, A Bend in the River

Annabel Patterson

Published in print: 2014-09-30

This chapter offers a reading of V. S. Naipaul's novel A Bend in the River, which chronicles the rapid changes in the Democratic Republic of the Congo after independence. It first provides a historical background on the arbitrary drawing or redrawing of national boundaries in Africa before discussing its implications for nationalism or internationalism in the region.

Caribbean migration to Britain brought many new things—new music, new foods, new styles. It brought new ways of thinking too. This book explores the intellectual ideas that the West Indians brought ...
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Caribbean migration to Britain brought many new things—new music, new foods, new styles. It brought new ways of thinking too. This book explores the intellectual ideas that the West Indians brought with them to Britain. It shows that, for more than a century, West Indians living in Britain developed a dazzling intellectual critique of the codes of Imperial Britain. Chapters discuss the influence of, amongst others, C. L. R. James, Una Marson, George Lamming, Jean Rhys, Claude McKay and V. S. Naipaul. The contributors draw from many different disciplines to bring alive the thought and personalities of the figures they discuss, providing a picture of intellectual developments in Britain from which we can still learn much. The introduction argues that the recovery of this Caribbean past, on the home territory of Britain itself, reveals much about the prospects of multiracial Britain.Less

West Indian Intellectuals in Britain

Bill Schwarz

Published in print: 2003-12-04

Caribbean migration to Britain brought many new things—new music, new foods, new styles. It brought new ways of thinking too. This book explores the intellectual ideas that the West Indians brought with them to Britain. It shows that, for more than a century, West Indians living in Britain developed a dazzling intellectual critique of the codes of Imperial Britain. Chapters discuss the influence of, amongst others, C. L. R. James, Una Marson, George Lamming, Jean Rhys, Claude McKay and V. S. Naipaul. The contributors draw from many different disciplines to bring alive the thought and personalities of the figures they discuss, providing a picture of intellectual developments in Britain from which we can still learn much. The introduction argues that the recovery of this Caribbean past, on the home territory of Britain itself, reveals much about the prospects of multiracial Britain.

Mr. Sampath is the story of Srinivas who arrives at Malgudi and realizes his proper goals. The first critical question on Mr. Sampath that Ranga Rao asks in this chapter is if Narayan identifies ...
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Mr. Sampath is the story of Srinivas who arrives at Malgudi and realizes his proper goals. The first critical question on Mr. Sampath that Ranga Rao asks in this chapter is if Narayan identifies completely with Srinivas, a point noted by V.S. Naipaul in his work India: A Wounded Civilization. Ranga Rao then questions what the novelist is up to in this novel. The style employed in this novel is using complex sentences with subordinate adverbial clauses. Ranga Rao notes extensively Naipaul’s critique of Narayan’s novel in this chapter. Thematically, the early comedy has been progressing towards this central interest; this perennial priority culminates in Mr. Sampath. This novel marks the end of pre-Independence phase of novels.Less

Enchantment in Life : Mr. Sampath1 and the Naipaul Enigma

Ranga Rao

Published in print: 2017-01-05

Mr. Sampath is the story of Srinivas who arrives at Malgudi and realizes his proper goals. The first critical question on Mr. Sampath that Ranga Rao asks in this chapter is if Narayan identifies completely with Srinivas, a point noted by V.S. Naipaul in his work India: A Wounded Civilization. Ranga Rao then questions what the novelist is up to in this novel. The style employed in this novel is using complex sentences with subordinate adverbial clauses. Ranga Rao notes extensively Naipaul’s critique of Narayan’s novel in this chapter. Thematically, the early comedy has been progressing towards this central interest; this perennial priority culminates in Mr. Sampath. This novel marks the end of pre-Independence phase of novels.

The expression ‘finding a voice’ is commonly used by writers to suggest the discovery of an aesthetic authority that governs the development of their subsequent work. Novelists such as V. S. Naipaul, ...
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The expression ‘finding a voice’ is commonly used by writers to suggest the discovery of an aesthetic authority that governs the development of their subsequent work. Novelists such as V. S. Naipaul, William Trevor, and J. M. Coetzee, and short story writers such as Alice Munro and Mavis Gallant have a distinctive sense of their discovery. They associate this trusted ‘true voice’ with the confidence to experiment, relying on intuition, memory, instinct, and an elusive sense of talent. It may be partially an echo of people close to the writer during formative years, such as parents or influential classic writers, but it is also rooted in each individual’s response to foundational realities of communication, such as displacement, cultural alienation, and linguistic self-consciousness.Less

Prologue : The writing voice

Denis Sampson

Published in print: 2016-05-01

The expression ‘finding a voice’ is commonly used by writers to suggest the discovery of an aesthetic authority that governs the development of their subsequent work. Novelists such as V. S. Naipaul, William Trevor, and J. M. Coetzee, and short story writers such as Alice Munro and Mavis Gallant have a distinctive sense of their discovery. They associate this trusted ‘true voice’ with the confidence to experiment, relying on intuition, memory, instinct, and an elusive sense of talent. It may be partially an echo of people close to the writer during formative years, such as parents or influential classic writers, but it is also rooted in each individual’s response to foundational realities of communication, such as displacement, cultural alienation, and linguistic self-consciousness.

This chapter contests theories on civilizational fault lines by introducing the voices of diversity in the writings of Aziz Ahmad and Mohammad Mujeeb on the one hand, and Nirad C. Chaudhuri and the ...
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This chapter contests theories on civilizational fault lines by introducing the voices of diversity in the writings of Aziz Ahmad and Mohammad Mujeeb on the one hand, and Nirad C. Chaudhuri and the Trinidad-born V.S. Naipaul, on the other. Of the four, Mujeeb alone showed awareness of the all-inclusive nature of the historical process of which he was part. The other three are naturally conservative, extol as knowledge what is already prejudice, and defend ways of thought and action that undermine democratic values. Nirad C. Chaudhuri has a critical position in the history traced here, being the heir to a great intellectual tradition in Bengal, with a mind moulded by the dominant ideas of his age.Less

Questioning Civilizational Fault Lines

Mushirul Hasan

Published in print: 2008-03-20

This chapter contests theories on civilizational fault lines by introducing the voices of diversity in the writings of Aziz Ahmad and Mohammad Mujeeb on the one hand, and Nirad C. Chaudhuri and the Trinidad-born V.S. Naipaul, on the other. Of the four, Mujeeb alone showed awareness of the all-inclusive nature of the historical process of which he was part. The other three are naturally conservative, extol as knowledge what is already prejudice, and defend ways of thought and action that undermine democratic values. Nirad C. Chaudhuri has a critical position in the history traced here, being the heir to a great intellectual tradition in Bengal, with a mind moulded by the dominant ideas of his age.